Remington Foster

Professor Williams
Eng. 231 - 83
11 November 2016
The Great Fathers of Literature
The American writers Washington Irving, Nathaniel Hawthorn, and Edgar Allan Poe, all
contributed awestriking and influential works. Each of these writers had unique experiences that
affected their writing; some of the most influential events were rather tragic heavy. One easily
recognizable trait between them is an intense awareness of human flaws, whether they be
physical by death, or mental by greed.In this work, I will analyze some great masterpieces by
these authors that define a large portion of American literature. Irving, Hawthorne, and Poe wrote
riveting stories shaped by the views they held on human nature; these perspectives gave these
memorable pieces their unique, dark style.
Our first writer is Edgar Allan Poe is a man who could be well defended as having the
most harsh and traumatic life. Edgar Allan Poe had a life that pushed him towards a view having
women be angelic being that were mistreated by the cruel illness of life, while men would be
viewed as unsympathetic or uncaring. In his early life, multiple tragedies had struck his family,
because these events where his mothers/ lovers die, he was left with a lonely and heartbroken
demeanor. All the while as this happened his fathers mistreated women and rejected him all
together. While these events were tragic they did provide a slew of inspiration for the terrifying
stories he wrote. Poe had written many stories, poems, and critiques. While he was primarily a
critic most of us today know him for the stories and poems that he gained fame without fortune
from. To start the list one of the great accomplishments of Edgar Allan Poe was founding the

dark detective genre with The Murders in the Rue Morgue. Poes writing of this story creates
the detective genre as mention before and he later continues that genre with other works, though
as you may note yourself, possibly the most interesting factor of the story that gave it so much
attention, is that the killer is an orangutan. This factor of the story is illogical and the surprises or
themes that life is not aligned with a persons explainable or logical expectations appear later
with other stories in a more intense manner. Examples being stories, such as The Black Cat,
which demonstrates how trying to justify everything with an odd excuse, even if backed by ones
own logic isnt the always the solution. In The Black Cat, he explores the idea that personal
logic cannot separate one from the guilt of an unjustified action. This is similar to the story of
Tell Tale Heart in that it shows how one man tries to justify murder by explaining an excuse
for the situation, using information that he fabricates. An example of this is seen in how the man
in The Black Cat produces the story in saying by some one of whom the animal must have
been cut from the tree and thrown, through an open window, into my chamber. This had probably
been done with the view of arousing me from sleep., as an excuse for the frame of the cat on the
wall, in order to avoid facing its significance. Poe shows just how much the man wishes to avoid
the significance of Plutos death as he has the character create this absurd thought. Other famous
examples of elements like this include situations from Tell Tale Heart, in how the man justifies
the murder by saying the old man had an evil eye and that was an excuse enough for murder,
as this story also shows how far the character will go in trying to prove that they are right in what
they do. A normal mind might have come to terms with what had happened in The Black Cat,
accepting the guilt of abusing and killing the cat, then moving on to a become better person. The
mind of the character in The Black Cat tries to explain away the guilt or significance of the
action by saying it was a justifiable action or that it wasnt a serious issue. This style of the

characters thought is what brings the man to his downfall as he never truly comes to terms with
it and forces his anger over guilt out through physical actions when he is reminded of what he
did by the new cat, eventually killing his wife. Poe truly highlights the fact that trying to run
away from the guilt of the actions you do using fabricated information is what an illogical mind
might do to justify itself. Poe can be said to have drawn inspiration for this story from his own
life as at some points there was madness and despair in his own experiences where he denied the
wrongs he has done or witnessed others doing the same. This explains how he understands an
insane person so well and how he makes such dark environments. His ability to understand
madness and despair through his experience is even more visible in other works that draw
directly from a specific experience he has had in life, one of which gains him a lumpsum of
fame.
The most famous example that I mentioned is the poem The Raven which draws
inspiration from Poes wrecked emotions when confronted with when his young wife Virginia
falls ill, added to the emotions he experienced with women he loved in his past dying. The poem
had obvious draws to the incidents in mentioning the love of the man having been dead. In Poes
own opinion losing a lover is the worst and most saddening experience a man could go through,
so he chose this to write on as it deepens the feelings of despair and sadness. In The Raven
many different details all accumulate together such symbols, references, personal experience,
and settings come together to create the mood that Poe is associated with. An example of one of
these can be found in Lenore being a symbol of a mans previous or current lover, and more
specifically in Poes case, his current wife or previous lovers. This detail gives a more personal
persona and deepens the concern for the person as a reader because most readers have loved in
one way or another. Another enhancement can be found in choosing the raven over other birds,

because ravens can be drawn to have roots with the being referred to as the bird of death in some
lore. Lastly the setting of a dark night in a house alone obviously leaves overtones of the dark
realty and lonely existence.
As stated previously, details like this all worked together to set the mood; however what
truly made the stories great was how Poe moved the plot using a provoking, point of focus, or
plot device. What I mean is that in each story there is an object that reinforces an idea. Examples
of this are the heart beat pushing the man to expose himself in Tell Tale Heart, and the new cat
in The Black Cat reminding the man of his crimes that led to his downfall, and finally in in
The Raven with the raven driving the man into a position where he accepts his fate in a pit of
despair. Overall, Poe wrote many stories, practicing his art to a perfect point balancing
environmentally created dread and story progression. An amazing writer that had a hard and
crippling life, though one could say that a lump sum of it eventually helped him because of the
inspiration that it gave him. Speaking of which, while on the subject of writers with a testing
history, lets move onto the next writer of great caliber.
Nathaniel Hawthorn was another writer that wrote influential pieces in his time, such as
The Scarlet Letter, Young Goodman Brown, and The Birthmark. Nathaniel was born in a
unique position as a product of a family that benefited from the wrongs committed in puritan
times during the Salem witch trials. The guilt he felt by being so closely related to the to the
trials, because of his grandfather being one of the judges, influenced many of the stories he wrote
criticizing the puritan past. One very well know work, The Scarlet Letter, shows many of his
criticisms of people and puritan society. These criticisms are revealed in the way that all of the
puritan citizens conduct themselves in this story. They all criticize Hester for her sin, acting as if
they have never committed sin themselves. The hypocrisy in doing this is obvious in that an

imperfect society is criticizing a generally good person for being imperfect; this idea is driven to
be even more apparent when the religion that they follow has forgiveness and unconditional love
as a large part of it. Even the letter plastered onto all of Hesters clothes as a symbol of adultery
is interpreted as having a different meaning in different events in the story which shows how
quick to judge the puritans are in some instances.
For example in chapter 3 of The Scarlet Letter, "Thus she will be a living sermon
against sin, until the ignominious letter be engraved upon her tombstone is said at the start of
the story having it be a symbol of shame and sin, though later in chapter 13, Hester has become
more accepted by the community, and the embroidered scarlet letter has evolved into a symbol
of her calling, not just her sin, is said, thus the meaning of the letter is changed to one
matching her nature of being able. This shows that Hesters nature is good and many of the
puritans judged her because of the letter when it was forced onto her. The symbolism in the
scarlet letter is unique and his style of great symbolism is not only seen in this story but many
others like The Birthmark.
As mentioned before Hawthorne did not like how puritan society disliked imperfection as
it was a part of human nature. This idea of humans having imperfections as a natural part of life
becomes even more apparent in The Birthmark, in that when Georgiana has her one unique
flaw, symbolized by the birthmark, removed she dies. The reason this happens is that because her
flaw was what made her a unique human being, the action of removing made her become perfect,
eventually leading her to be unable to live in this natural, imperfect world. Hawthorne also
reveals another criticism of people that he has, which is that people are greedy and some are
never satisfied. This can be spotted in the nature of Aylmers want to remove the birthmark that
makes Georgiana perfect. Most of the town recognizes that she is extremely beautiful and that

her imperfection is what makes her perfect or natural in a sense, though Alymer seeks to
remove it as his hunger to have more perfection drives him to do so. In both of these pieces his
unique style of having a dark view of human nature is shown and his writing style compliments
it, setting him apart from other writers of his time.
Some people talk about Hawthorne as a very influential transcendentalist, though one of
the key aspects of Hawthornes wrings is his criticism of societies dark traits, and another is his
focus on story development. These two key aspects of Hawthorns writing are what separates
him from transcendentalist and what made him different type of writer. Hawthorne had a unique
style that had themes of unfair judgement painted all over it and intriguing symbols like the letter
A in The Scarlet Letter that stood out in the way that it could be interpreted as having multiple
separate meanings throughout the story depending on the setting. Hawthornes style was notable
and unique in his time, just as our next writers was too.
Sliding onto a happier note, Washington Irving had an easy early life, being born into a
high-class family given a very good education. Irving gained a good start in literature for the
most part and was influenced by an American Romantic style of writing from reading the
books of the time. While he was influenced by American Romanticism he himself was not one,
Irving actually fell into the category of American Gothic or Brooding Romantic, which was
a darker version of the American Romantic that explored the human capacity for evil. The
main reason he delved in to this form of writing is the close succession of deaths of his wife and
parents in his later life, along with his experience in the conflicts in politics. One other factor that
affects his writing is German folklore which comes from many of the books he read while in
Europe. All of these factors come together to create some of his greatest works, which made him
the Father of American literature. One famous work he created shows many of the aspects that

I talk about in a short story. In Rip Van Winkle the story reads out a tale similar to an old
German folktale which has magic and supernatural themes, which matches some of his other
works, though this story has a political undertone. This hidden political metaphor in the story is
an interesting addition that you can find in many of his works, though this should not be a
surprise as he was a man very involved in the subject. The story is used as a sort of catalyst to
warn American about what to avoid as a man or a woman, as the flaws shown can lead to ruin.
The more specific message is that men should not avoid work, instead embrace work as it brings
reward. The consequence it shows for being lazy are missing great events, losing your value as a
person, and endangering what you have. This message is delivered through the experience of Rip
Van Winkle, who is lazy and suffers the products of being such. In the story it is shown that
while he is able to please children and is sometimes a helpful hand to those around him, he is
inevitably useless to his family. This fact is made very clear by his wife stating all of his
shortcomings and it is because of laziness she speaks of that he never gets anywhere or does
anything to aid the family he created. The man chooses to run away from his problems rather
than confront and improve his life constantly and eventually finds a set of men that lead him into
a hibernation for 20 years. Upon returning to his House after his great slumber and finding
everything different, he tries to reason, though he ends up seeming crazy to the town folk. While
eventually he does get, a happy ending being able to stay lazy under the housing of his daughter
using the excuse of his old age, viewing his life he ends where he began as someone who is more
of a burden to their family and in addition to this, misses one of the most important events in
history. While this story seems odd and hard to drag into relation with real life the lessons taught
in this are clear and important, its translation into life is real.

The translation of this into real life is that if a man doesnt work he reaps nothing and
misses what life has to offer. He also implants a lesson for the women of his time in the story in
that while complaining is sometimes needed if taken overboard it can drive people away, shown
in how Madame Van Winkle cripples Rip Van Winkle and eventually drives her husband away by
constantly nagging. While not enormously apparent Irving uses Rip Van winkle to point this out
with lines such as Poor Rip was at last reduced almost to despair (Irving 480) to describe his
condition when running away after being harassed by his wife. The lesson displayed in this story
is wildly apparent and he stressed the importance of it because if Americans were to all resort to
being lazy, they would go nowhere, eventually leading to the downfall of America. Irving wrote
other stories, that also had characters with imperfections which led them to their downfall, such
as The Legend of Sleepy Hallow. While these stories revolve around downfall, they also serve
as a warning that gives hope to future generations as to get them to avoid unwanted fates. Irving
was a Great writer and while he did focus a large portion of his works on human imperfections
they served as warning to get people to avoid failure. Having all this considered we can form a
picture of what kind of writer he was.
Washington Irving was a great writer who had a lot of experience traveling the world,
witnessing mistakes, and working through the deaths close to him. Washington Irving had taken
his large amount of experience and combined it with his story telling skills to create works that
are remembered in even our time. Irving saw the unique position the US was in, then took the
position he had with politicians, and the position he had in literature as a writer, to influence
America to avoid problems he had come across in other areas. In his stories, he has different
symbols and themes that all come together to teach a lesson. The lessons he gives in these

stories help the people who read them avoid mistakes and hopefully help America as a whole
too. Now to bridge this great author with the other great authors.
Washington Irving, Nathaniel Hawthorn, and Edgar Allan Poe, were all great American
writers that used their dark views of human nature to write their stories. Each writer focused on a
specific of human nature; Irving revealed human imperfections that lead to a persons downfall,
Hawthorne focused on unfair human judgement, and Poe centered around the cruel nature of
sanity with the weight of loss. Their works created the art that influences people even in our
time, and will most likely continue to have an impact the future. While the harsh nature of life
and people is sad it should not weigh us down as they are a part of our world, as Americans we
should be an embodiment of strength, human understanding, and general good, because without
it, we will be as dark as the evil in those stories.

Works Cited

Baym, Nina, and Robert S Levine. Baym, Nina, and Robert Levine, Eds. The Norton
Anthology of American Literature. Shorter 8th Ed. Vol. 1. Norton. 2013. New York, N.Y., W.W.
Norton &Amp; Company, 2013.
Hawthorne, Nathaniel. The Scarlet Letter. Pleasantville, NY, Reader's Digest Association,
1984.
Lei, Nan. "A Brief Study on the Symbolic Meaning of the Main Characters' Name in the
Scarlet Letter." Theory and Practice in Language Studies 5.10 (2015): 2164-8. ProQuest. Web.
28 Nov. 2016.
Poe, Edgar Allan. The Raven. Toronto, KCP Poetry, 2006.
Stone, Jay. "Quoth the Raven, 'Nevermore'; John Cusack Stars as Edgar Allen Poe in
Loopy, Violent Literary Mystery." Alaska Highway NewsApr 30 2012. ProQuest. Web. 28 Nov.
2016 .
Thoreen, David. "Thomas Pynchon's Political Parable: Parallels between Vineland and
"Rip Van Winkle"." Anq 14.3 (2001): 45-50. ProQuest. Web. 28 Nov. 2016.